Brisebois was born on June 28, 1969, in Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Mary and Frank Brisbois, a computer instructor. She is of French-Canadian and Italian descent.[1] She began her career as a child actress appearing in her first movie, The Premonition (1976), at the age of seven. In 1977, she appeared in an episode of Kojak and began starring in the original Broadway cast of Annie as the youngest of the orphans, Molly. (Jay-Z later sampled a clip of Brisebois from Annie for his song "Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)"). In the late 1970s, she joined the cast of All in the Family later also starring in its spin-off Archie Bunker's Place in the early 1980s. She was nominated for six Young Artist Awards from 1980 to 1984, winning two; in 1981 as Best Young Actress in a TV Special for Mom, the Wolfman and Me and in 1982 as Best Young Actress in a Television Series for Archie Bunker's Place. In 1982 she was also nominated for a Golden Globe as Best Supporting Actress in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for TV, again for Archie Bunker's Place.[2]

Brisebois began her career as a recording artist in the early 1990s by providing backing vocals on Intoxifornication, the 1992 album by rock singer Gregg Alexander; this marked the beginning of a long-standing collaboration with Alexander, who co-wrote, produced and sang on her first solo album Arrive All Over You in 1994. Despite a disappointing commercial performance in U.S, the album became a minor hit in Europe, Arrive All Over You performed well critically and continues to maintain a cult following. Mackenzie Wilson of Allmusic described the album as "an earnest and impressive effort ... [that] went largely unnoticed during the reign of gangsta rap and grunge" and compared it favourably to Alanis Morissette's Jagged Little Pill.[4] Her cover of "Gimme Little Sign" was a minor hit in Europe.

In 1998, Brisebois became a member of Alexander's New Radicals group, who scored their greatest successes with the hit single "You Get What You Give" and the million-selling album Maybe You've Been Brainwashed Too. She provided distinctive female vocals to the group's sound on tracks such as "Mother We Just Can't Get Enough" and "Jehovah Made This Whole Joint For You". Alexander quickly disbanded the group in 1999, but went on to produce and co-write Brisebois' second solo album, Portable Life, which was originally scheduled to be released on October 26, 1999. Promotional copies of the album and the single "I've Had It" were distributed, reviews appeared in the press and an "I've Had It" video was even shot, but for unknown reasons RCA Records cancelled the release at the last minute. The album was delayed until September 30, 2008, when it was released as a digital download via iTunes and Amazon.com. A compilation album of Arrive All Over You-era tracks, entitled Just Missed the Train, was later released through Sony BMG on September 26, 2006.[citation needed]

In 2012, Brisebois co-write the Halestorm's song "Here's To Us", which was featured on the season finale of Glee. Her recent credits also include co-writing the song "Forward" with Gregg Alexander, Nick Lashley and Fred Golding for President Obama's re-election campaign.